Many network devices process data at a rate where using a conductive cable impractical. For example, the I/O rate of the network device may mean that it requires too much power or introduces too much noise to use a conductive cable (e.g., an Ethernet cable). Thus, if high speed signals need to be transferred between network devices, the devices may use fiber optic cables which can accommodate much higher data rates at much greater distances than conductive cables.
The network devices can include one or more photonic chips which couple to the optical cables. For example, a photonic chip can couple to over hundred different fiber optical cables. However, testing optical components in the photonic chips can be difficult if not impossible until the photonic chips have been mounted and aligned to the optical cables. For example, it may be impossible to test the optical components in the photonic chips (e.g., optical modulators, optical detectors, and the like) while the photonic chips are still in a wafer—i.e., before the wafer is sawed into individual photonic chips.